Identity Is Our Operating System - Part 4
By Tom Kagy | 23 Aug, 2025

Asian males growing up in America face extra challenges in identity formation when their self-images clash with White prejudices and expectations.

Hello, this is Tom Kagy with Unconventional Wisdom.

Welcome to part four of Identity is Our Operating System. Identity is more than an abstract concept. It's literally our operating system. It's what sets our priorities and preferences, our affiliations and attractions, our goals in life, and a sense of our ultimate destiny.

In this part, I am exploring another key factor in our identity formation — how we're received by peers and how we interact with them. This aspect of identity formation has an extra dimension for an Asian male growing up in America, especially in a setting in which we're interacting predominantly with Whites with their own prejudices, phobias, and insecurities toward Asian males who challenge their expectations.

The interactions between a young Asian male and his white peers is especially stark in the context of an all-male military school like Fishburne, the setting of most of Chapter 4 of my college novel, The Summerset, which represents my deepest examination of the factors that went into my own identity formation.

The Summerset, Chapter 4

I usually came home drunk, opening the doors quietly so as not to awaken my family, and picked my way carefully through the pitch-black living room to my porch room. If I was drunk enough, I could flop on the bed and lose consciousness painlessly. Otherwise, I lay staring out at the reticent stars until I was suddenly cold sober, feeling the sense of incompleteness and dissatisfaction that oppressed so much more at night. During those bleak small hours, I flicked on the reluctant fluorescent lamp and rummaged through the boxes of sentimental paraphernalia and plain junk that were heaped on one side of the room.

A box containing the letters I had written home during my high school years in the States was one of the first things to engage my bleary-eyed interest. Chronological order being almost a neurotic obsession of mine, I arranged all the letters by their postmarks before starting to read them. The first three dozen were sent from Waynesboro, Virginia during the year I spent at Fishburne Military School. And I began reading those with the curious dread you feel when about to overhear a conversation about yourself.

September 6, 1970.

Dear Ma and Papa,

It's Sunday and I've just returned from church. Since they force everyone to go to church, I went to the Presbyterian church with my roommate, Ellis Simmons. I'll get along with him just fine because he's also intelligent and is on the football team too. I'm sure I'll be a starting halfback for the JV team and Simmons has the best chance for quarterback.

But am I glad football camp is finally over. Five hours a day, morning, afternoon and evening is a little too much. Three guys quit on the second day and Coach Keller made them give their reasons in front of the whole team. Afterwards, everyone called them cakes and a few other names I won't mention. You know how Ma is. The other boys are here now and we started wearing our uniforms today. Grey shirt, black tie, grey pants with black stripes, overseas cap, and spit shined shoes. They are a pain in the butt. They've issued everyone 03s for drills.

Us first-year guys are called rats. We have to wear our caps at all times. We have to do a weird thing called bracing when we walk around inside the quadrangle. The old men can also make us do just about anything they want, but they pick on grubs mostly. This place is like an ancient red brick fortress with ivy creeping all over it. You can smell the oldness. Among the boys are the sons of General Lavelle, Admiral Gehring, and the nephew of Senator Byrd, and a few others. On the other hand, there are a lot of boys from juvenile halls, too. Letter writing hour is almost over now, and we have town leave in a few minutes. Ellis says hello. How is everything at home? Write soon. Love, Bob.

At 5'6 and 130 pounds, Nicholas was the townie killer.

He had a hawk nose, thick, leering lips, and murderously narrow eyes. In his rat ear Nicholas had bloodied the mouths of three old men who had tried to make him do push-ups for failing to salute them. He was a lieutenant now, but he warned the rats that he would beat the shit out of them if they ever tried to salute him.

I was one of the boys sitting around at Fishburne Drugs, listening to his discourses on the absurdities of regulations. Afternoon town leave was almost over and we strolled up the hill. A beat up yellow Dodge slowed alongside us.

"You bellhops ain't nothing but a bunch of pussies, you hear?" shouted the driver, whose burly arm hung outside.

"Step out here, boy, if you got the balls." Nicholas whipped out his belt.

We did the same, wishing that the heavy steel buckles were a lot heavier. Nicholas assumed a bow-legged stance that made him look even shorter.

The driver hefted his couple of hundred pounds onto the sidewalk while his gang spilled out like roaches. A moment of panic and exhilaration. The gleaming Phillips head screwdriver that the burly man unsheathed from a paper bag. Nicholas lurching forward with a cry. The flash of his belt buckle and a sudden red gash below the townie's eye.

My body shot forward. A foot and a fist landed against a townie. There was a bewildered look in his eyes and a cry of surprise sprang from my throat. In another instant, the car was roaring away. Nicholas leered at me.

"We took care of them pussies, ey Jap?" he said, threading his belt back into the loops. "What say your name was?"

"Taratelli."

"You don't look like no wop."

"I'm half Korean."

"You from North or South Korea?"

"South."

He nodded and clapped me on the back.

After dinner, several rats were gathered in Inman's room discussing the fight.

"Well, those townies were just plain cakes," he said.

"You're the cake, Inman," I retorted. "I didn't see you out in front."

"Hey, fuck you, Taratelli. I can take you, no sweat at all."

"You boys gonna just talk or show us some action?" said a tall thin cadet named Hutter, breaking the momentary silence.

"Shut up, Hutter," said Simmons. "Just ignore him, Bob. Ain't no sense in getting thrown out of school your first week here."

"You're on, Inman," I said. And we proceeded to the gym.

Hutter knocked discreetly on every door along the way and intimated that there was to be a fight. By the time Inman and I had removed our hats, ties, collar stays, shirts, and shoes, half the corp had turned out to form a rough circle around us. We squared off and began circling slowly, our eyes glassy from the concentration. I had no desire to fight him. He was one of the boys I liked. But the crowd wanted a fight and they would have a fight.

We drew together, prodded by the catcalls. And just as we were within arm's reach, drew back. I sensed from the shouts that I was the favorite and felt that I owed them something. I rushed in, proceeded by an ineffectual storm of fists. And after a brief exchange in which we only hit each other's arms, we came apart. This aroused the mob to a frenzy, then quickly disappointed them.

"Don't tell me both of you're chicken shit," said a reproachful voice.

There were small beads of perspiration on Inman's upper lip.

"I could finish you off with my karate anytime, Taratelli," he said.

This drew a chorus of jeers, and a few voices urged him to use it in that case.

"I'm a blue belt," he said.

"Let's see you use it then," I taunted. What do blue belts know about karate? "Come on, kick me."

He assumed a cat stance and immediately abandoned it when I charged in, swinging rapidly at his head. He ducked and with a wild swing whacked the side of my head, making my ears ring. This encouraged him to attempt an awkward front kick that only set him off balance, his right leg momentarily held ineffectually in the air, and his torso thrown helplessly back in an attempt to regain his balance. I kicked him in the stomach and he fell over with a groan. A wild cheer went up from the mob as it closed in.

"You won," gasped Inman, holding a limp hand for me to grasp.

"Kill him, step on him," urged Guzman, a cadet from South America.

Inman looked up anxiously.

"Aren't you even going to get up?" Guzman berated him scornfully.

I wondered why he hated Inman so strongly. Then I was picked up and carried out of the gym, leaving Inman alone on his knees.

That night I concluded that my big toe was cracked. I had managed to walk without a noticeable limp, but I knew football was now out of the question. I dreaded what the team members would say when I told them that I was quitting. I didn't intend on telling anyone that I had broken my toe kicking Inman. I would be the laughing stock.

On Monday afternoon, Coach Keller had me stand up on the bleachers while the football squad gathered solemnly in front of me. They were all looking at me, but their eyes refused to meet mine. I almost changed my mind and briefly thought it would be better to have them laugh at me than to have them think that I was a cake. But it was too late. They knew why I was standing on the bleachers, not in football gear. I decided to quit the team.

There was only the sound of cleats shifting on the cinder track. Gehring, the captain as well as battalion commander, began putting on his helmet.

"Why?" he said simply, as if the matter were only of passing interest. He had forced on the helmet and was toying with the chin strap.

"I'm too tired to study at night after practice."

He nodded and snapped on the strap. "Well, at least you didn't quit during camp like those three cakes," he said, and led the team out on the field at a trot. At that moment, Ghering became my idol.

I was tossing and turning long after taps that night, unable to take my mind off the disgrace of quitting.

"Damn it, Bob! You shouldn't have quit," said Ellis suddenly. I had thought he was asleep. "You don't get nowhere unless you're on the team."

"How about Nicholas?"

"Hell, he's a star wrestler. Besides, just because everyone's scared shitless of him doesn't mean they like him. You never see guys like Ghering, Lavelle and Taylor associating with him, do you?"

"Well, I'll be on distinguished honor roll. They give out rank on basis of grades, so we can still be BC and XO in three years."

"Honor roll don't mean shit except with parents and faculty," he said impatiently. "Hell, look at Morris. He got way better grades than Gehring, and he ain't nothing but a measly CC. And band company at that!"

He turned over as if to show that the discussion was over. I knew he was right and that didn't help me get to sleep any easier.

"We could have run this place in our senior year and had that luxury suite up on third floor," he added, as if he couldn't rub it in enough. "You blew it all when you quit, shithead!" With that, he turned over again.

"Fuck you, Simmons."

"Hey, Jap, you ain't bracing," said a voice from across the quadrangle.

I'd grown accustomed to doing only a cursory imitation.

"Drop and do thirty right now!" It was Johnson, a large, fat redhead with pale skin. His face was covered with a generous number of blotches that were charitably called freckles.

"I was bracing Johnson," I insisted, letting him know that I regarded him with disdain.

"You're asking for it, Taratelli!" he shouted, pointing a sausage finger at me. "I mean it. Do thirty right now!" He was shaking with impotent rage. "Make it forty!"

I pretended not to hear him and continued walking.

"Do what the old man tells you, said Rallis who happened to be passing by.

I dropped down and did forty with Johnson looking on.

A few days later I was scheduled for guard duty. During study period I stood out in the center of the quadrangle to make sure that no one was walking outside of their rooms. An early snow gave the school an atmosphere of tranquility, and I thought happily of the Christmas vacation I would be spending in Los Angeles with my family who would be there on home leave. The military regimen and petty coarseness of the cadets had begun to seem oppressive. But now, standing under the clear starlit sky, I could feel that it wasn't so bad.

I saw Johnson sneaking out of his room and walking rapidly across the stoop. Hey, Johnson, don't you know it's study hall? Get back into your room unless you want a few demerits to march off, I said gleefully. He stopped and gave me a pained look, then continued walking.

Alright, that's five." He stopped. "'Taratelle, you got a lot to learn. You can't buck the system like that and get away with it. Get back in your room right now unless you want another five.' He cursed as he went back to his room.

At the end of the first term, Simmons and I were the only ones on Distinguished Honor Roll. And a rumor began that we had been cheating off each other, dividing up the work between us. After a while, even our instructors began regarding us suspiciously whenever we sat anywhere near each other in our classes. I was sure they matched all of our homework for signs of collaboration.

"You know what this means, don't you?" said Ellis.

Shelley, our English instructor, had told us in class that one of us would have to do our paper on a different topic from the rest of the class. He had said it without a trace of a smile or preamble, as if it were a proven fact that we cheated. But I also felt that that wasn't the only reason for Ellis's decision to move out of the room. And I had been preparing for a switch for some time.

"I'd rather room with Brun anyways," I said lightly. "He doesn't tap his fucking pencil against his teeth when he studies." The next day, he moved in with Hutter.

We stood on a dark street corner on an unseasonably warm Saturday night in late March, passing around a pint of Ancient Age we had acquired for an exorbitant price from Jackson, the school bootlegger.

We heard the pleasant chattering of girls approaching along the street and soon saw three girls slip into view. Two were our age and cute and one was older and fat.

"Evening girls," said Brun, working up his most suave voice.

"'Lo y'all," said the girl wearing a white sweater and a green miniskirt. Her legs were nice and slender and she had long red hair.

"Whatcha girls doin'?"

"Gettin' some air and maybe goin' down to Fishburne Drugs," said White Sweater.

"What're you all doin?" ventured the cute one with shy, full lips. She wore a brown dress that wasn't quite as short as White Sweater's. The fat one was holding onto her arms.

"This is what we're doing," I said, holding up the bourbon. "Why don't you girls join us?"

They looked at one another and the cute ones shrugged agreeably. The fat one tugged at Brown Dress's arm and mumbled something that had the quality of a protest.

"There's not a thing doing at Fishburne's," avowed Dean as if he had been wasting his time there all night.

"Why not?" said White Sweater pleasantly, taking the bottle. She had faint freckles and lovely white teeth. Her delicate white throat worked rapidly as she took a long drink.

"Well, Louisa!" protested Brown Dress to the persistent tugging of the fat girl. "You can go on down if you like. We'll see you later."

The fat one shot her an angry look and took off in a huff.

Brown Dress smiled and took the bottle gingerly in her hand as if it were a bomb.

"Where you from?" White Sweater took my garrison cap and placed it jauntily on her head. Her eyes sparkled from the bourbon.

"Korea. You been there of course?"

"No, I never been out of this here state," she answered seriously. "Are you Japanese? No, no." She shook her head looking briefly exasperated at herself. She took another drink before continuing.

"What's your name?"

"Bob deBoop."

She regarded me suspiciously then laughed. "I know! You're one of those Thai boys, am I right?"

There were four boys from Thailand at Fishburne. Satisfied about my nationality, she tugged me a little ways away from the others.

"You know that girl, Louisa?" she asked in a confidential whisper. I nodded as if I had known Louisa since childhood.

"Well, she's gotten, you know, knocked up by some boy from Charlottesville and she's supposed to meet him at Fishburne's tonight."

"You're not serious," I gasped. She nodded adamantly.

"That other girl, Mary Ann, is her sister."

"What's your name?"

"Sissy Gilliam," she said this brightly as if I should have known that it could have been none other.

"Well, Miss Gilliam," I said, insinuating her toward the narrow street that led to a dirt road. "You have the prettiest red hair I've seen in years." I didn't particularly care for red hair, but Sissy was sexy.

"Do I?" She turned around to called to her friend. "I'll see you at Fishburn's."

We slid our arms around each other. She had a firm slender waist that undulated deliciously as she walked.

She slipped on the loose gravel road, obliging me to grip her tightly.

"My, you saved my life," she sighed, placing a hand lightly on her breast. Then she placed her hands on my shoulders and we kissed. I guided her over to the deep, soft grass at the side of the road.

After picking off the bits of grass from each other, Sissy insisted on accompanying me back to the school.

"Don't hurry so," she complained. "You're bouncing like a rubber ball."

As we were walking below the barracks, a voice called out from a third floor window.

"That you, Sissy?" It was Jackson.

"Hello, Frankie," she said, waving, and I wished I could evaporate from her arms and blow quietly through the guard shack to the barracks. All I needed was a platoon leader for a mortal enemy.

"Who's that? That you, Taratelli?"

I confessed that it was.

"Hadn't you better be back in the barracks, boy?"

I agreed that I probably should, said goodnight to Sissy, and pulled away.

"Good night," Bob deBoop.

Simmons and I were the only ones at Fishburne to make Distinguished Honor Roll again.

"You brains make me sick," said Brun, upturning the plump red lower lip of his baby face. We were at dinner. "I worked my ass off and only barely pulled C's."

"That's 'cause you're as dumb as a nigger, Brun," said Simmons. His cold blue eyes and aristocratic nose seemed to complement his hauteur.

"Speaking of niggers," said Hutter, "I hear they're going to let one in next year."

This drew several distasteful remarks.

"No shit, because this place gets funds from the government."

Holy Jesus," Simmons began, and I got up to get some more milk. On my way back, I passed a table full of officers.

"You something special, Taratelli," asked Perkins with a leer.

"What?"

"Why don't you go sit with the other Japs?" He nodded toward the table occupied by the four Thai boys.

The thought had never occurred to me, and even while looking at them I did not understand for a moment. Satisfied with his remark, Perkins resumed his leer.

"Hell," Simmons was saying. "With a 2 and 6 record, maybe what this school needs is a good jig halfback. Remember that nigger at Blue Ridge that tore us up?"

"This place is going to the dogs," said Hutter, shaking his head sadly. "My old man will withdraw me sure if they do."

"And how about at Augusta?" Simmons continued. "Hell, 'taint hardly fair. I say we ought to get us one too." His eyes clouded with the enormity of the decision. "As long as I don't have to room with him."

The nearer it got to Spring Leave, the more this song was heard on campus:

All I want is a three-day pass,
a case of beer and a piece of ass.
No more eating Campbell's Hash,
no more dating Fairfax trash.

"Dammit, Brun! I've got to get this finished by tonight or else Shelley will have a shit fit." I was trying to finish a hawkish editorial for CQ, our school paper while Brun had been pestering me with algebra problems.

"Look, I'm sorry, Taratelli, but just one more. If I don't come through this term, my parents won't be sending me back here next year." He had been puffing nervously on cigarettes while studying, and the smoke had formed a dense haze in the room.

"Would you put that damn cigarette out? You smoke like a fucking train."

I helped him grudgingly for the dozenth time.

"How many times do I have to tell you? Always do the function in the brackets first!"

"Hey, thanks a lot, man," he said, and returned to his desk.

After a few minutes, he pushed his chair back.

"Taratelli?"

"Yeah?"

"I'd like to have you stay over at my house if you don't have any plans for the break." He rapped nervously on the desk with his pencil. I had been waiting for an invitation from Simmons that had never come.

"Thanks, but I think I'll just stay here for the break."

"Okay, sure," said Brun and went back to puzzling over his second-degree algebraic equations.

"Hey, Brun," I said after my typewriter had been silent for some time. "I might as well help you with your algebra." He turned to me eagerly with a grin. "You dumb shit," I added.

On the day leave began, there was April snow for the first time in 22 years in Waynesboro. Before the afternoon was out, it had covered over the tracks made by the jubilant cadets and their parents who had come to pick them up. After the last exultant cries and laughter had died away, I went over to the TV room and stared at the flickering screen along with two Thai boys and a pale bespectacled boy from Oregon whose name I had never bothered to learn.

After suppering on crackers and coke from the vending machines, I escaped the depressing company and returned to my room to write a pathetically cheerful letter telling how I would spend the leave with my roommate. The full moon leered coldly as I lay thinking of the good time I had had during Thanksgiving leave with Simmons, and the plans we had made — those painful reminders of an irretrievably lost future.

The snow melted in a few days, leaving behind the fragrant blossoms, so romantically nostalgic, that made me ache for things ten thousand miles away. I sat for hours on the windowsill, feeling the warmth of the same yellow sun that shone over Korea, and listening over and over to Sweet Caroline.

In charge of the ROTC program at Fishburne was a young Army major who had a penchant for painstakingly realistic military training exercises. Major Miles's crowning achievement was the elaborate two-day field maneuvers in late May. The corps was divided into two armies, distinguished from each other by the bright red scarves of the Red Army.

After arming us with blanks, artillery simulators, and walkie-talkies, Major Miles marched us out to a forest outside of town, dressed in our fatigues. Along the way we passed a grazing brown mare. Major Miles quickly ducked under the wire fence and patted the horse tenderly on the muzzle.

"Good morning, Suzy Wong," he said.

By evening, the excitement of battle was accelerating to a climax and the maneuvers had taken on the innuendos of an American involvement in Asia. The dusky woods were thick with wild cries and commands, rustling of running feet, rifle cracks, and the always terrifying whistle and explosion of the artillery simulators. Our platoon had been engaged in several frays and only four of us remained, tired but anxious to fire off what was left of our blanks.

We wandered aimlessly in search of the enemy. With a sudden violent rustling of leaves, several figures dropped down from the trees around us, firing as they fell. I felt a hot blast on my back and spun around.

"Take that, you gook," cried Hutter, firing another blast against my chest.

"You fuckhead!" I grabbed his rifle barrel and wrenched it from his hands.

"You're supposed to be dead," he cried in indignation, his frame trembling violently.

I dropped the rifles and with a solid punch to his jaw sent him sprawling back into the underbrush. The battle stopped abruptly.

"You shouldn't have done that, Tartelli," said Simmons hotly. "This isn't a real war, you know.

"He fired that damn thing right up against me!"

Suddenly it was not too dark to see the hostile faces around me. Simmons, Goering, Jackson, Johnson.

Hunter was sitting off to the side holding his jaw. Major Miles appeared out of nowhere.

"If you can't participate in these war games like a soldier instead of a bully, then maybe you should remain in your room tomorrow to think over your conduct." This won a murmur of general approval and he continued, "The next time you hit someone, I will personally recommend you for expulsion!" He stalked away, abandoning me to the wolves.

Gehring stepped up to me. "Why'd you do it, Tartelli?" His square jaws were set grimly and his small eyes glittered coldly. Had there been a single friendly or even a neutral face, I might have answered him.

"Fucking Jap," muttered several voices. My face burned as I gazed mutely into Gehring's eyes. I wanted to call out, You cowards, I'll face you one by one. As if in answer to my thought, Simmons came forward and faced me intently.

"Hunter's my friend and I'd like to fight you for him." Then with a quick sidewise glance at the crowd of faces, "and I believe I can whip you too."

"Yeah, why don't you fight him?" demanded Gehring coldly.

With each silent second that passed, Simmons's eyes grew bolder with the drops of courage distilled from the mob behind him. I looked down.

"You puss," said Gehing, turning away.

As I walked back alone to school along the thankfully dark and endless road, I cursed myself for not having accepted Simmons' challenge.